Toward Safer Spaceflight

Modern astronauts are spending ever greater amounts of
time in space, exposed to the little-understood effects
of cosmic radiation. NASA and Brookhaven National Lab
have established a joint lab—the NASA Space Radiation
Laboratory (NSRL)—on the Brookhaven campus to study
the possible effects of this exposure.

Run sheets, run schedules, outgoing data libraries, beam use summaries and more.

Why Space Radiation Matters

Since astronauts now routinely spend six or more months in space,
they receive more exposure to ionizing radiation , a stream of particles
that, when passing through a body, may cause atoms and molecules within
that substance to become ionized. The ionization process damages
components of living cells, including DNA, that may inhibit cell
reproduction and repair. This, in turn, may lead to cell mutations that
cause serious illness, or shortened life spans. By one estimate, for each
year that astronauts spend in deep space, about one-third of their DNA
will be directly hit by ionizing particles.

What We Do

The research conducted at NSRL increases our understanding of the
link between ionizing radiation and cell damage. Our work seeks to limit
the damage to healthy tissue by cosmic radiation, leading to safer space
exploration for astronauts ad possible improvements in cancer-fighting
treatments for all.

The NSRL uses beams of heavy ions extracted from Brookhaven's Booster
accelerator, the best in America for radiobiology studies, to simulate
the cosmic rays found in space. NSRL features its own beam line
dedicated to radiobiology research and state-of-the-art specimen
preparation resources. Within NSRL, scientists expose biological
specimens---tissues, cells, and cell DNA---to beams of heavy ions. Other
experimenters use industrial materials as samples, studying their
suitability for space suits and spacecraft shielding.

One of ten national laboratories overseen and primarily funded by the Office of Science of the
U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Brookhaven National Laboratory conducts research in the physical,
biomedical, and environmental sciences, as well as in energy technologies and national security.
Brookhaven Lab also builds and operates major scientific facilities available to university, industry
and government researchers. Brookhaven is operated and managed for DOE's Office of Science by Brookhaven
Science Associates, a limited-liability company founded by the Research Foundation for the State
University of New York on behalf of Stony Brook University, the largest academic user of Laboratory
facilities, and Battelle, a nonprofit applied science and technology organization.